A Walk on the Wild Side

Okay, let's wrap this dead horse up! I'm ready to be back in our own country; but first, one last look at the United Arab Emirates. This time, we're going to take an excursion OUT of Dubai, into the neighboring Emirate of Sharjah. From what we were told, and by the general feel and atmosphere of the place, Sharjah is a much more conservative (ie. Sharia law) kind of place. All local women were veiled, no photography was allowed in the zoo, and we were warned of heavy fines for acting "inappropriately".

Our first destination (of what we had originally planned as many)was the Arabian Wildlife Center- AKA the zoo. It is strange knowing NariLoo has only been to the zoo twice in her short little life!

It really was very well done! There were more snakes (mostly poisonous!) that we had time to devote to, and more spiders, lizards and small mammals that we could get to, as well. The enclosures were very well themed and clean and all the signs were in both Arabic and English.

Sorry, no photos save one:

One of the highlights was the hyena in labor (pacing quite a bit) and the flamingos. NariLoo thought the baboons were funny, and Pixie especially liked the birds- as usual.

We were all quite hungry by the time we were done, and since we were pretty much isolated at this place (more on that later!) we opted to eat at the cafeteria. It had a nice variety of choices, but of course, we went for the Pakistani- again! It wasn't nearly as good as at Ravi's, (which, obviously, I'm still raving about!) but it was passable and filled us up. I think watching the herd of indigenous deer and the flock of flamingos while we ate was the highlight though.

Moving on from the zoo, we walked over to the botanical gardens. This was a very tourist friendly collection of exhibits whose aim was to inform the happy tourist the many secrets of plants. There were many hands-on, touchy- feely things to see and do here, and the kids had a blast playing, smelling, touching, and seeing, it all. Here are a couple of my favorite pics.:

The last "museum" in this secluded little cluster of touristy places was the petting zoo. ALL the kids LOVED this place- even The Water Guy got into the action here. It was a blast holding out hay to the camels, sheep, cows, goats and chickens. Not to belabor the experience, here you go with a few visuals:

One drawback of going out to Sharjah was the isolation that I mentioned earlier. It cost us almost $50 by taxi and over and hour to get back to our hotel. It was way out there, and apparently, there was no local bus that went out there either. Buyer, beware!

So, that's it. The trip home (back to our -stan) was quite uneventful, and that's been chronicled here already, just think in reverse order, okay? Plane, train, taxi...

For the sake of posterity, let's re-cap and put some finishing thoughts down.

Dubai is a wonderful place IF:

1) You love to shop 2) You like mediocre beaches 3) You like museums and shopping in old bazaars 4) You like to eat adventurously 5) or you don't like to eat adventurously- as there are thousands of chain type places to eat at 6) you like sand- there was plenty of it 7) you like the desert environment- a lot! and 8) you don't mind trying to negotiate your way around and having things described with a heavy accent.

WHEW! There you have it; we've DONE DUBAI!

I am very excited to share with you the photos we brought home of our recent trip out to the steppe next time. The turtles were out, the lizards were out, the flowers were out, and hey, so were we! So, next up, some beautiful shots of our lovely (at times) surroundings, and

Until Next Time,

Your SteppeSister